The Happytime Murders

[Ian Jane Administrator Find all posts View Profile Close Ian Jane]

"Starring Melissa McCarthy, THE HAPPYTIME MURDERS is set in the underbelly of Los Angeles where puppets and humans coexist. Two clashing detectives, one human and one puppet, are forced to work together to try and solve who is brutally murdering the former cast of 'The Happytime Gang', a beloved classic puppet show. Directed by Brian Henson (Muppet Treasure Island, Muppet Christmas Carol) and starring Melissa McCarthy, Maya Rudolph, Joel McHale and Elizabeth Banks."

[The Silly Swede Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close The Silly Swede]

yeah...nooo.

[CrumpsBrother Member Find all posts View Profile Close CrumpsBrother]

Oh, man, really? I thought McCarthy was hilarious in this trailer! Hoping for a Meet The Feebles good time...

[Mark C. Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Mark C.]

This looks really absurd, gotta give them points for trying something really off the wall and dare I say original.

[Alex K. Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Alex K.]

This looks really absurd, gotta give them points for trying something really off the wall and dare I say original.

Not when Meet The Feebles did it first.

[Dom D Spoon! Find all posts View Profile Close Dom D]

yeah...nooo.

Yeah...maybe? I don't know looks kind of funny to me. There's a few influences that spring to mind. Obviously Meet The Feebles. Who Framed Roger Rabbit is kind of the grand daddy of this sort of thing. Then there was that Ben Edlund scripted episode of Angel where people were being killed on a kids muppets style program. And Angel became a muppet. Im a bit vague on the details but I remember it was good. In fact all those films are good so, hell, why not?

[Matt H. Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Matt H.]

Not when Meet The Feebles did it first.

There weren't any humans interacting with the puppets in it, though.

[The Silly Swede Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close The Silly Swede]

Yeah...maybe? I don't know looks kind of funny to me. There's a few influences that spring to mind. Obviously Meet The Feebles. Who Framed Roger Rabbit is kind of the grand daddy of this sort of thing. Then there was that Ben Edlund scripted episode of Angel where people were being killed on a kids muppets style program. And Angel became a muppet. Im a bit vague on the details but I remember it was good. In fact all those films are good so, hell, why not?

Ok, Ill give you the maybe. But Melissa McCarthy has really worn out her welcome with me.

[Dom D Spoon! Find all posts View Profile Close Dom D]

This film is roughly 15% titles. It's not often you see a Hollywood feature having to pad out its runtime with credits to hit the magic 90 minute mark. I can sympathize. I've been there. But I sure didn't have the audacity to do end titles for 11 minutes.

Anyway I did not hate this. It's not good but it hits a good line or visual every 7 or 8 minutes and that's not bad these days.

Just needs a bit of tone. Over the interminable credits for a couple minutes they run Basic Instinct music. It would've been cool if they'd pushed that kind of tone, or any kind of tone, rather than just going loud and trying to stagger from punchline to punchline.

The Muppetery(?) is excellent.

[Matt H. Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Matt H.]

Although it wasn't the secret gem I was hoping it would be, I also didn't hate it and it's definitely worth seeing once. It's disappointing that they weren't more ambitious with the humour, though; a lot of it is uninspired and lazy.